White Wings: A Yachting Romance, Volume III

CHAPTER XII.

EXPECTATIONS

It was a fine piece of acting. These two continued to talk about the coming of our young Doctor as if it were the most simple and ordinary affair possible. All its bearings were discussed openly, to give you to understand that Mary Avon had nothing in the world to do with it. It was entirely a practical arrangement for the saving of time. By running across to Paris he would jump over the interval between our leaving West Loch Tarbert and this present setting-out for the north. Mary Avon was asked about this point and that point: there was no reason why she should not talk about Angus Sutherland just like any other.

And, indeed, there was little call for any pale apprehension on the face of the girl, or for any quick look round when a sudden sound was heard. It was not possible for Angus to be anywhere in our neighbourhood as yet. When we went on deck next morning, we found that we had been idly drifting about all night, and that we were now far away from any land. The morning sun was shining on the dark green woods of Armadale, and on the little white sharp point of Isle Ornsay lighthouse, and on the vast heather-purpled hills in the north; while over there the mountains above Loch Hourn were steeped in a soft mysterious shadow. And then, by and by, after breakfast, some light puffs of westerly wind began to ruffle the glassy surface of the sea; and the White Dove almost insensibly drew nearer and nearer to the entrance of that winding loch that disappeared away within the dusky shadows of those overhanging hills. Late on as it was in the autumn, the sun was hot on the sails and the deck; and these cool breezes were welcome in a double sense.

We saw nothing of the accustomed gloom of Loch Hourn. The sheer sides of the great mountains were mostly in shadow, it is true; but then the ridges and plateaus were burning in the sunlight; and the waters of the loch around us were blue, and lapping, and cheerful. We knew only that the place was vast, and still, and silent; we could make out scarcely any sign of habitation.

Then, as the White Dove still glided on her way, we opened out a little indentation of the land behind an island; and there, nestled at the foot of the hill, we descried a small fishing-village. The cottages, the nets drying on the poles, the tiny patches of cultivated ground behind, all seemed quite toy-like against the giant and overhanging bulk of the hills. But again we drew away from Camus Ban – that is, the White Bay – and got further and further into the solitudes of the mountains, and away from any traces of human life. When about mid-day we came to anchor, we found ourselves in a sort of cup within the hills, apparently shut off from all the outer world, and in a stillness so intense that the distant whistle of a curlew was quite startling. A breath of wind that blew over from the shore brought us a scent of honeysuckle.

At luncheon we found to our amazement that a fifth seat had been placed at table, and that plates, glasses, and what not had been laid for a guest. A guest in these wilds? – there was not much chance of such a thing, unless the King of the Seals or the Queen of the Mermaids were to come on board.

But when we had taken our seats, and were still regarding the vacant chair with some curiosity, the Laird's hostess was pleased to explain. She said to him, with a shy smile,

"I have not forgotten what you said; and I quite agree with you that it balances the table better."

"But not an empty chair," said the Laird, severely; perhaps thinking it was an evil omen.

"You know the German song," said she, "and how the last remaining of the comrades filled the glasses with wine, and how the ghosts rattled the glasses. Would you kindly fill that glass, sir?"

She passed the decanter.

"I will not, begging your pardon," said the Laird, sternly, for he did not approve of these superstitions. And forthwith he took the deck chair and doubled it up, and threw it on the couch. "We want the young man Sutherland here, and not any ghost. I doubt not but that he has reached London by now."

After that a dead silence. Were there any calculations about time; or were we wondering whether, amid the roar and whirl and moving life of the great city, he was thinking of the small floating-home far away, amid the solitude of the seas and the hills? The deck-chair was put aside, it is true, for the Laird shrank from superstition; but the empty glass, and the plates and knives, and so forth, remained; and they seemed to say that our expected guest was drawing nearer and nearer.

"Well, John," said Queen Titania, getting on deck again, and looking round, "I think we have got into Fairyland at last."

John of Skye did not seem quite to understand, for his answer was —

"Oh, yes, mem, it is a fearful place for squahls."

"For squalls!" said she.

No wonder she was surprised. The sea around us was so smooth that the only motion visible on it was caused by an exhausted wasp that had fallen on the glassy surface and was making a series of small ripples in trying to get free again. And then, could anything be more soft and beautiful than the scene around us – the great mountains clad to the summit with the light foliage of the birch; silver waterfalls that made a vague murmur in the air; an island right ahead with picturesquely wooded rocks; an absolutely cloudless sky above – altogether a wonder of sunlight and fair colours? Squalls? The strange thing was, not that we had ventured into a region of unruly winds, but that we had got enough wind to bring us in at all. There was now not even enough to bring us the scent of the honeysuckle from the shore.

In the afternoon we set out on an expedition, nominally after wild-duck, but in reality in exploration of the upper reaches of the loch. We found a narrow channel between the island and the mainland, and penetrated into the calm and silent waters of Loch Hourn Beg. And still less did this offshoot of the larger loch accord with that gloomy name – the Lake of Hell. Even where the mountains were bare and forbidding, the warm evening light touched the granite with a soft rose-grey; and reflections of this beautiful colour were here and there visible amid the clear blue of the water. We followed the windings of the narrow and tortuous loch; but found no wild-duck at all. Here and there a seal stared at us as we passed. Then we found a crofter's cottage, and landed, to the consternation of one or two handsome wild-eyed children. A purchase of eggs ensued, after much voluble Gaelic. We returned to the yacht.

That evening, as we sate on deck, watching the first stars beginning to tremble in the blue, some one called attention to a singular light that was beginning to appear along the summits of the mountains just over us – a silvery-grey light that showed us the soft foliage of the birches, while below the steep slopes grew more sombre as the night fell. And then we guessed that the moon was somewhere on the other side of the loch, as yet hidden from us by those black crags that pierced into the calm blue vault of the sky. This the Lake of Hell, indeed! By and by we saw the silver rim appear above the black line of the hills; and a pale glory was presently shining around us, particularly noticeable along the varnished spars. As the white moon sailed up, this solitary cup in the mountains was filled with the clear radiance, and the silence seemed to increase. We could hear more distinctly than ever the various waterfalls. The two women were walking up and down the deck; and each time that Mary Avon turned her profile to the light the dark eyebrows and dark eyelashes seemed darker than ever against the pale, sensitive, sweet face.

But after a while she gently disengaged herself from her friend, and came and sate down by the Laird: quite mutely, and waiting for him to speak. It is not to be supposed that she had been in any way more demonstrative towards him since his great act of kindness; or that there was any need for him to have purchased her affection. That was of older date. Perhaps, if the truth were told, she was rather less demonstrative now; for we had all discovered that the Laird had a nervous horror of anything that seemed to imply a recognition of what he had done. It was merely, he had told us, a certain wrong thing he had put right: there was no more to be said about it.

However, her coming and sitting down by him was no unusual circumstance; and she meekly left him his own choice, to speak to her or not as he pleased. And he did speak – after a time.

"I was thinking," said he, "what a strange feeling ye get in living on board a yacht in these wilds: it is just as if ye were the only craytures in the world. Would ye not think, now, that the moon there belonged to this circle of hills, and could not be seen by any one outside it? It looks as if it were coming close to the topmast; how can ye believe that it is shining over Trafalgar Square in London?"

"It seems very close to us on so clear a night," says Mary Avon.

"And in a short time now," continued the Laird, "this little world of ours – I mean the little company on board the yacht – must be dashed into fragments, as it were; and ye will be away in London; and I will be at Denny-mains: and who knows whether we may ever see each other again? We must not grumble. It is the fate of the best friends. But there is one grand consolation – think what a consolation it must have been to many of the poor people who were driven away from these Highlands – to Canada, and Australia, and elsewhere – that after all the partings and sorrows of this world there is the great meeting-place at last. I would just ask this favour frae ye, my lass, that when ye go back to London, ye would get a book of our old Scotch psalm-tunes, and learn the tune that is called Comfort. It begins 'Take comfort, Christians, when your friends.' It is a grand tune that: I would like ye to learn it."

"Oh, certainly I will," said the girl.

"And I have been thinking," continued the Laird, "that I would get Tom Galbraith to make ye a bit sketch of Denny-mains, that ye might hang up in London, if ye were so minded. It would show ye what the place was like; and after some years ye might begin to believe that ye really had been there, and that ye were familiar with it, as the home of an old friend o' yours."

"But I hope to see Denny-mains for myself, sir," said she, with some surprise.

A quick, strange look appeared for a moment on the old Laird's face. But presently he said —

"No, no, lass, ye will have other interest and other duties. That is but proper and natural. How would the world get on at all if we were not to be dragged here and there by diverse occupations?"

Then the girl spoke, proudly and bravely —

"And if I have any duties in the world, I think I know to whom I owe them. And it is not a duty at all, but a great pleasure; and you promised me, sir, that I was to see Denny-mains; and I wish to pay you a long, long, long visit."

"A long, long, long visit?" said the Laird cheerfully. "No, no, lass. I just couldna be bothered with ye. Ye would be in my way. What interest could ye take in our parish meetings, and the church soirées, and the like? No, no. But if ye like to pay me a short, short, short visit – at your own convenience – at your own convenience, mind – I will get Tom Galbraith through from Edinburgh, and I will get out some of the younger Glasgowmen; and if we do not, you and me, show them something in the way of landscape-sketching, that will just frighten them out of their very wits, why then I will give ye leave to say that my name is not Mary Avon."

He rose then and took her hand, and began to walk with her up and down the moonlit deck. We heard something about the Haughs o' Cromdale. The Laird was obviously not ill-pleased that she had boldly claimed that promised visit to Denny-mains.

CHAPTER XIII.

"YE ARE WELCOME, GLENOGIE!"

When, after nearly three months of glowing summer weather, the heavens begin to look as if they meditated revenge; when, in a dead calm, a darkening gloom appears behind the further hills, and slight puffs of wind, come down vertically, spreading themselves out on the glassy water; when the air is sultry, and an occasional low rumble is heard, and the sun looks white; then the reader of these pages may thank his stars that he is not in Loch Hourn. And yet it was not altogether our fault that we were nearly caught in this dangerous cup among the hills. We had lain in these silent and beautiful waters for two or three days, partly because of the exceeding loveliness of the place, partly because we had to allow Angus time to get up to Isle Ornsay, but chiefly because we had not the option of leaving. To get through the narrow and shallow channel by which we had entered we wanted both wind and tide in our favour; and there was scarcely a breath of air during the long, peaceful, shining days. At length, when our sovereign mistress made sure that the young Doctor must be waiting for us at Isle Ornsay, she informed Captain John that he must get us out of this place somehow.

"'Deed, I not sorry at all," said John of Skye, who had never ceased to represent to us, that, in the event of bad weather coming on, we should find ourselves in the lion's jaws.

Well, on the afternoon of the third day, it became very obvious that something serious was about to happen. Clouds began to bank up behind the mountains that overhung the upper reaches of the loch, and an intense purple gloom gradually spread along those sombre hills – all the more intense that the little island in front of us, crossing the loch, burned in the sunlight a vivid strip of green. Then little puffs of wind fell here and there on the blue water, and broadened out in a silvery grey. We noticed that all the men were on deck.

As the strange darkness of the loch increased, as these vast mountains overhanging the inner cup of the loch grew more and more awful in the gloom, we began to understand why the Celtic imagination had called this place the Lake of Hell. Captain John kept walking up and down somewhat anxiously, and occasionally looking at his watch. The question was whether we should get enough wind to take us through the narrows before the tide turned. In the meantime mainsail and jib were set, and the anchor hove short.

At last the welcome flapping and creaking and rattling of blocks! What although this brisk breeze came dead in our teeth? John of Skye, as he called all hands to the windlass, crave us to understand that he would rather beat through the neck of a bottle than lie in Loch Hourn that night.

And it was an exciting piece of business when we got further down the loch, and approached this narrow passage. On the one side sharp and sheer rocks; on the other shallow banks that shone through the water; behind us the awful gloom of gathering thunder; ahead of us a breeze that came tearing down from the hills in the most puzzling and varying squalls. With a steady wind it would have been bad enough to beat through those narrows; but this wind kept shifting about anyhow. Sharp was the word indeed. It was a question of seconds as we sheered away from the rocks on the one side, or from the shoals on the other. And then, amidst it all, a sudden cry from the women —

"John! John!"

John of Skye knows his business too well to attend to the squealing of women.

"Ready about!" he roars; and all hands are at the sheets, and even Master Fred is leaning over the bows, to watch the shallowness of the water.

"John, John!" the women cry.

"Haul up the main tack, Hector! Ay, that'll do. Ready about, boys!"

But this starboard tack is a little bit longer, and John manages to cast an impatient glance behind him. The sailor's eye in an instant detects that distant object. What is it? Why, surely some one in the stern of a rowing-boat, standing up and violently waving a white handkerchief, and two men pulling like mad creatures.

"John, John! Don't you see it is Angus Sutherland!" cries the older woman pitifully.

By this time we are going bang on to a sandbank; and the men, standing by the sheets, are amazed that the skipper does not put his helm down. Instead of that – and all this happens in an instant – he eases the helm up, the bows of the yacht fall away from the wind, and just clear the bank. Hector of Moidart jumps to the mainsheet and slacks it out, and then, behold! the White Dove is running free, and there is a sudden silence on board.

"Why, he must have come over from the Caledonian Canal!" says Queen Titania, in great excitement. "Oh, how glad I am!"

But John of Skye takes advantage of this breathing space to have another glance at his watch.

"We'll maybe beat the tide yet," he says confidently.

And who is this who comes joyously clambering up, and hauls his portmanteau after him, and throws a couple of half-crowns into the bottom of the black boat?

"Oh, Angus!" his hostess cries to him, "you will shake hands with us all afterwards. We are in a dreadful strait. Never mind us – help John if you can."

Meanwhile Captain John has again put the nose of the White Dove at these perilous narrows; and the young Doctor – perhaps glad enough to escape embarrassment among all this clamour – has thrown his coat off to help; and the men have got plenty of anchor-chain on deck, to let go the anchor if necessary; and then again begins that manoeuvring between the shallows and the rocks. What is this new sense of completeness – of added life – of briskness and gladness? Why do the men seem more alert? and why this cheeriness in Captain John's shouted commands? The women are no longer afraid of either banks or shoals; they rather enjoy the danger; when John seems determined to run the yacht through a mass of conglomerate, they know that with the precision of clock-work she will be off on the other tack; and they are laughing at these narrow escapes. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that only one of them laughs. Mary Avon is somewhat silent, and she holds her friend's hand tight.

Tide or no tide, we get through the narrow channel at last; and every one breathes more freely when we are in the open. But we are still far from being out of Loch Hourn; and now the mountains in the south, too – one of them apparently an extinct volcano – have grown black as night; and the wind that comes down from them in jerks and squalls threatens to plunge our bulwarks under water. How the White Dove flees away from this gathering gloom! Once or twice we hear behind us a roar, and turning we can see a specially heavy squall tearing across the loch; but here with us the wind continues to keep a little more steady, and we go bowling along at a whirling pace. Angus Sutherland comes aft, puts on his coat, and makes his formal entry into our society.

"You have just got out in time," says he, laughing somewhat nervously, to his hostess. "There will be a wild night in Loch Hourn to-night."

"And the beautiful calm we have had in there!" she says. "We were beginning to think that Loch Hourn was Fairyland."

"Look!" he said.

And indeed the spectacle behind us was of a nature to make us thankful that we had slipped out of the lion's jaws. The waters of the loch were being torn into spindrift by the squalls; and the black clouds overhead were being dragged into shreds as if by invisible hands; and in the hollows below appeared a darkness as if night had come on prematurely. And still the White Dove flew and flew, as if she knew of the danger behind her; and by and by we were plunging and racing across the Sound of Sleat. We had seen the last of Loch Hourn.

The clear golden ray of Isle Ornsay lighthouse was shining through the dusk as we made in for the sheltered harbour. We had ran the dozen miles or so in a little over the hour; and now dinner-time had arrived; and we were not sorry to be in comparatively smooth water. The men were sent ashore with some telegram – the sending off of which was the main object of our running in here; and then Master Fred's bell summoned us below from the wild and windy night.

How rich and warm and cheerful was this friendly glow of the candles, and how compact the table seemed now, with the vacant space filled at last! And every one appeared to be talking hard, in order to show that Angus Sutherland's return was a quite ordinary and familiar thing; and the Laird was making his jokes; and the young Doctor telling his hostess how he had been sending telegrams here and there until he had learned of the White Dove having been seen going in to Loch Hourn. Even Miss Avon, though she said but little, shared in this general excitement and pleasure. We could hear her soft laughter from time to time. But her eyes were kept away from the corner where Angus Sutherland sate.

"Well, you are lucky people," said he. "If you had missed getting out of that hole by half an hour, you might have been shut up in it a fortnight. I believe a regular gale from the south has begun."

"It is you who have brought it then," said his hostess. "You are the stormy petrel. And you did your best to make us miss the tide."

"I think we shall have some sailing now," said he, rubbing his hands in great delight – he pretends to be thinking only of the yacht. "John talks of going on to-night, so as to slip through the Kyle Rhea narrows with the first of the flood-tide in the morning."

"Going out to-night!" she exclaimed. "Is it you who have put that madness into his head? It must be pitch dark already. And a gale blowing!"

"Oh, no!" he said, laughing. "There is not much of a gale. And it cannot be very dark with the moon behind the clouds."

Here a noise above told us the men had come back from the small village. They brought a telegram too; but it was of no consequence. Presently – in fact, as soon as he decently could – Angus left the dinner-table, and went on deck. He had scarcely dared to glance at the pale sensitive face opposite him.

By and by Queen Titania said, solemnly:

"Listen!"

There was no doubt about it; the men were weighing anchor.

"That madman," said she, "has persuaded Captain John to go to sea again – at this time of night!"

"It was Captain John's own wish. He wishes to catch the tide in the morning," observed Miss Avon, with her eyes cast down.

"That's right, my lass," said the Laird. "Speak up for them who are absent. But, indeed, I think I will go on deck myself now, to see what's going on."

We all went on deck, and there and then unanimously passed a vote of approval on Captain John's proceedings, for the wind had moderated very considerably; and there was a pale suffused light telling of the moon being somewhere behind the fleecy clouds in the south-east. With much content we perceived that the White Dove was already moving out of the dark little harbour. We heard the rush of the sea outside without much concern.